Hyderabad: Poor Muslims count on zakat during Covid crisis

Hyderabad: As Ramzan month has begun amidst lockdown, civil society groups have called upon the affluent to ensure their Zakat (poor tax) this year reaches the destitute and the needy across the State, who account for 63 per cent of the total population of Muslims. Zakat is a religious obligation for all Muslims to give away money to the poor, which is believed to purify their earnings.

According to a survey by Helping Hand Foundation, around 63% of Muslims in the city are below the poverty line (BPL), while other 37% are financially stable and 2% are elite families. The survey was conducted in slums of Old City during the lockdown. As many as 2,528 households were covered in over 50 urban slums, south and west of the city, including Chandrayangutta, Baba Nagar, Vattapally, Hassan Nagar, Balapur, Yakutpura, Kalapather, MD Lines, Shaheennagar, Sultan Shahi, TalabKatta etc.

Approximately 60% or more Muslims in Hyderabad constitute weaker sections. It is found that 80% of them are daily wagers. Auto drivers form the largest pool of daily income earners, accounting for 18% to 20% of the daily wagers, and 55% are other daily wage workers like carpenters, plumbers, labour in kirana shop, hotels, mechanic & workers marriage halls, cooks etc. Most importantly 15% of them are widows with no male earning member in the family.

"The aim is to help donors make informed choices on their donations through Zakat this Ramzan. HHF has come up with a high-level socio-economic classification of Muslims in Hyderabad. We believe that such data on the socio-economic background of the principal minority community will be useful in making informed choices", said Mujtaba Hasan Askari of HHF.

Md Iftekharuddin Ahmed, president of Muslim Reservation Front of Telangana, and Moulana Md Mohsin Pasha Ansari Qadri (Moulvi Jamia Nizamia), general secretary of All India Sunni Ulema Mashaiq Board, called upon the well-off to pay sadaqa and zakat to charitable trusts and religious institutions, keeping in mind the conditions of those affected by lockdown. They urged Chief Minister K Chandrashekar to spend the money earmarked for annual Iftar party and other programmes of Ramzan amongst poor Muslims by directly transferring money in their accounts.